NOVAK DJOKOVIC must have been loving it. While he was safely tucked up in bed after a luxurious day off, Andy Murray was in the transport queue at Melbourne Park waiting for a car to take him home.

Andy Murray and coach Amelie Mauresmo during a training session at the Australian Open

He had just taken four hours and three minutes to get the better of Milos Raonic 4-6, 7-5, 6-7, 6-4, 6-2 and it was past 1am. Murray had reached his fifth Australian Open final but standing between him and the trophy is the seemingly unstoppable - and now well rested - Djokovic.

The semi-finals are split over two days in Melbourne so the first man through to the final has two rest days to prepare and the second just one.

Murray's big task now is to recover well after his physical five sets yesterday and come up with a plan to beat the world No1.

The Serb has beaten him three times in the Melbourne final: twice Murray simply did not play well and then last year, he was taking the match to Djokovic when he let his concentration waver. Distracted by what Djokovic was doing at the other end of the court, Murray let the match run away from him.

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They have played 30 times in the past and Murray has won only nine times. Since he won Wimbledon in 2013, Murray has faced the Serb 11 times and won just once, although he did come close in the French Open semi-finals, taking it to five sets.

But that one victory at the Canadian Open last summer will be the starting point for Amelie Mauresmo, Murray's coach, as she discusses the game plan for tomorrow.

"That's what we're going to talk about tomorrow and before the match," she said. "So at least that's something that was really important for him to be able to win against Novak again since the Wimbledon final and he did that in August so we'll see.

"Maybe losing in the past got to him but it didn't break him. So now he comes back even stronger each time believing that he can do it. Yeah, he's been in the last spot a few times and he's really putting a lot of effort to try to get the trophy on Sunday."

After his performance yesterday, Murray had cause for optimism. He only dropped his serve once in the five sets, and that in the opening game as Raonic came out all with all guns blazing. The tall Canadian was stepping up to the baseline to thump his forehand, he was pounding his serve - sometimes at over 140mph - and he was attacking the net.

But Raonic was not just belting the ball, he was constructing his points with care and precision. He was inch-perfect on his ground strokes and on the placement of his serves. And then he tightened up for a moment at the end of the second set and Murray pounced to take it from his racket strings.

There was nothing Murray could do about the third set tiebreak - Raonic played it almost perfectly. But then, three games into the fourth set, the Canadian called for the trainer to treat a groin injury. From then on, his serve lost a little of its bite, Murray's returns found their mark and the world No2 was in charge.

"I was starting to hit the ball better in the third set," he said. "I was hitting the ball cleaner from the back of the court. I wasn't allowing him to dictate as many of the points as I was at the beginning.

"I just tried to keep going, keep making as many returns as possible, and continue to make it difficult for him. Eventually I was able to engage in more baseline rallies and dictate more of those points, which made him do more of the running."

Serena Williams has dictated most of the points during her stay in Melbourne and she is now one match away from joining Steffi Graf in second place in the list of all-time Grand Slam winners.

If she beats Angelique Kerber in the final today, she will win her 22nd major trophy. Only Margaret Court, with 24 titles, has more.

"I relish every win and every final and every match now," Williams said. "Maybe in the past I didn't as much. I was just going through the motions. Even though I was super excited, now it's even more exciting."